Android updates to be easier and faster

Being a die hard android fan ever since the platform was launched has really tested my patience with software updates. This as it is must go with every android fan out there given the fact that the updates take at least 6 months to reach us and many at times are delayed even longer. Each and every year we all seat and wait for the good news from google and the fancy names they gives they dish out be it Jelly bean, Icecream Sandwich etc and after that we even forget about it till the updates reach us. By saying this I am address the high end android phone owners and not the idios and Samsung pocket crew because the hardware never allows such phones to receives uodates.

One of the more important announcements from Google’s I/O event was the announcement of the Android Platform Development Kit (PDK). The PDK is targeted to hardware developers such as Sony Mobile, Samsung and HTC. The idea behind it is to help to shorten the time taken for manufacturers to port the latest and greatest Android release.

The Beta version of the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean PDK has been available to a few partners over the last few weeks, although we have no confirmation of exactly who these partners are. Going forward beyond Jelly Bean, the PDK will be available to hardware manufacturers around 2-3 months before the release date of future Android versions.

This is good news for all Android owners and should mean that we see much speedier updates to new Android versions. If you look at what happened with Ice Cream Sandwich, manufacturers like Sony Mobile, would have received the code at exactly the same time as when the SDK (software development kit) was publicly released. This is why despite ICS being announced in October 2011, Sony Xperia devices only started to receive the update from April 2012. The introduction of the PDK should mean that going forward this lengthy gap should be considerably shorter.